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Topic: Army Builder of the Year (Read 3455 times)

I thought this might be a fun topic. Something I don't think has been done before... Army Builder of the Year... going back from 1995... what do you think was the BEST army builder each year and what will be the best for 2006? Here's my choices... excluding the VOTC or other "premium" figures -

For POTF2 my choices are highly limited really... Out of them I don't really consider Jawas as army builders... I like the Death Star Gunner and AT-AT Driver. The TIE Pilot was good... till Hasbro went and showed me it wasn't.

POTJ I hands down agree the Imp. Officer all the way. I have a ton and feel that's a figure I'd buy in droves cast in grey... I'd love if they used the TIE Pilot pack-in's bendable legs on it too for some poseability. I'd take a black and grey hat paintjob variant on it too as both were seen in the films. A runner-up (or three) in POTJ though were the Bespin Guard that set all kinds of standards, the Boomer Droid, or the Gungan Warrior.

The Death STar Trooper I disagree with... Whatever year he was competing there had to be something better. The pose just blows, he's been one of the worst in the line IMO, though his head is very well done with a nice helmet.

For E1 I'd go with the Battledroid... It was just nice to me.

For POTF2 I think the Rebel w/Atgar Laser Cannon was one of the better ones though it holds up poorly today and obviously needs a resculpt.

For ROTS it's #41 Clone to me...

For OTC it's the Cloud Car Pilot...

For Saga '04 I think Captain Antilles counts enough to get a nod from me. He's got everything right that the Fleet Trooper got wrong and short of knee articulation he's almost, in my eyes, perfect.

Clone Wars I'd give the nod to the SA Clone of course irregardless how difficult it is to find.

- I can safely say that I Army Built way more PotF2 Sandtroopers than Jawas from those late red card, early green card days.

- I agree with Jesse, the DST was very hard to find for me (and many many others). I was lucky to find ONE let alone army build with him. For availability reasons, I'd pick the Endor Rebel from the FF era. He was cheap and easy to find.

- For RotS, I'd chose a Clone that actually got screen time - like the #6 Shocktrooper or #65 TacOps over the boring white #41.

I ended up with about 6 of the DST's - but only one was found in stores. I found him and a Ree Yees at walmart one night - only one of each, and never saw or heard of them in stores again. My friends were only able to get them when they got offered through the star wars insider later on.

I concur with Jesse on the DST as far as pose. I never got one at retail. The only deal I had for a trade went south when the other guy heard/read on another site that they were going to start shipping so he backed out of the deal (and kept the stuff I sent to trade). I have a ton now, but they don't rank because of the legs.

I ended up with about 6 of the DST's - but only one was found in stores. I found him and a Ree Yees at walmart one night - only one of each, and never saw or heard of them in stores again. My friends were only able to get them when they got offered through the star wars insider later on.

At the time thise were like holy grails for me. I found a few in the store, bought a couple more from the fan club and then bought few more from an on-line retailer for not too outrageous of a price. Now I can't wait for a resculpt.

I did my best on the years of those figures in my first list, I think they are all correct in terms of release date.

I don't know, I really like the old Death Star Trooper still. When it came out it was amazing. About the only thing about it that I don't like is the pose, but in 1998 getting a removable helmet on a figure like that was just about unheard of. They did a good job on a lot of those Freeze Frame era figures. That figure was very hard to come by and I was so glad they repacked it in the SAGA line a few years back.

As for the ROTS, I can't say that I really like the Shocktrooper or the Tactical Ops trooper too much just because I think they should have used the superior sculpt and articulation of the #41 Clone.

And not nitpicking Jeff's list, but I always hated the POTF2 Sandtrooper (and buff Stormie) - just horrible sculpts I think, even by the standards of the time. They look like play-dough that somebody stepped on to me, I was always so turned off my those sculpts. I went with many more Jawas at that time because they seemed to actually look like a character out of Star Wars while the buff Stormies of the day looked awful.

The Security Battle Droid is definitely a good choice though for 2000... probably better than the blow apart Destroyer Droid which I still think though is by far the best Destroyer. The ROTS Wookiee Gunner also is a great figure I think that is barely surpassed by the #41 Clone.

And not nitpicking Jeff's list, but I always hated the POTF2 Sandtrooper (and buff Stormie) - just horrible sculpts I think, even by the standards of the time.

Yeah, that PotF2 sculpt looks worse with each passing year, but when I saw it for the first time on the pegs I had to have me a pile of them. First ever version of a Sandtrooper? I musta bought 10-12 of them... they've all been replaced now with PotJ Troopers, but at the time I couldn't get enough of them.